In their first meeting since the pandemic, the ideologically leftist Grupo de Puebla senses an opportunity. While waiting for “progressive winds” from the next electoral processes, the democratic and authoritarian left are closing ranks against neoliberalism. The final declaration also supports Latin American dictatorships, led by Cuba. Meanwhile, the Spanish populist right-wing party VOX is trying to position itself in Latin America as the spearhead of the anti-communist struggle. This bipolar dynamic puts the forces of the centre-right spectrum, in particular, in trouble.
Radiant and without masks, the former Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, Rafael Correa, and the current Mexican Foreign Minister, Marcelo Ebrard, posed in front of the photographer. They have just inaugurated the Grupo de Puebla (GP), which brought together around 200 “progressive leaders” from November 30th to December 1st in the Mexican capital. However, the signal that the meeting should send under the slogan “Change now” was evident: the united left is back, gaining influence and uniting against the common opponent. He called for nothing less than the replacement of the “anachronistic neoliberal model” with a “model of solidary development”.
Although the document has few concrete contributions on what this new model should look like, it generally manifests itself in favor of a strong role for States in public investment, a special session of the UN General Assembly on global paths out of the pandemic, of the decarbonization of the economy, of “multilateralism”, of a global minimum tax of at least 21% and of the “values of feminism”.
As for the commitment to freedom and democracy, the document is ambivalent. While calling for “a democratization that makes room for new voices”, in the 2629-word text, democracy only appears once again as a positive basic concept.
According to its website, the Foro de São Paulo today brings together 123 parties from 27 countries, from the Communist Party of Cuba to the Socialist Unity Party of Venezuela (PSUV) and democratically established center-left forces such as the Socialist Party of Chile, the of the Workers of Brazil or the Frente Amplio of Uruguay. The most important organizational difference between the FSP and the GP is that the former is a formal association of parties, while the latter is formed by a group of individuals. In both organizations, however, there is the same fusion between autocratic, populist and democratic elements. In both cases, it is evident that ideology is more important than democracy.
Praise to Mexico, Cuba and Venezuela
As a gift to the host, so to speak, the GP celebrates the “deepening of democracy” of the left-wing populist government of Mexican head of state Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Just a few days earlier, he had issued a decree that would allow him, instead of the legal bidding process, to carry out important infrastructure projects practically by hand and without any transparency. However, former President Dilma Rousseff celebrated the Mexican government as a “light” for “Latin American integration”.
The GP’s final declaration also unreservedly adopts the rhetoric of the Cuban dictatorship when it shows solidarity with the “Cuban people” and names US sanctions as the cause of “social unrest” and the latest protests by “networks and enemies of the Cuban revolution financed and promoted by the United States”. The GP also declares its “support for Venezuelan democracy” and rejects any “foreign interference”.
It is clear that the international left in Latin America senses an opportunity. After the changes in political direction in Mexico (2018) and Argentina (2019), the political axis shifted further to the left by the elections in Bolivia (October 2020), through Chile (election to the constituent assembly in May 2021). ), Peru (June 2021) and more recently in Honduras (November 2021). According to former Colombian President Ernesto Samper, in Mexico City great hope was placed on a persistent “progressive wind” in the region and, therefore, on an electoral victory for Gabriel Boric on December 19 in Chile, for left-wing populist Gustavo Petro in Colombia in 2022 and former President Lula da Silva in October 2022 in Brazil.
The populist right’s response
As the antagonist of the two leftist alliances since the beginning of the pandemic, the Spanish populist right-wing party Vox is trying to position itself specifically. Its president, Spanish deputy Santiago Abascal, intensively promotes the Madrid Forum, an “international alliance to fight communism in the Iberosphere”. The objective is to find a “response to the São Paulo Forum and the Puebla Group”.
To face them, different political and social leaders of different political orientations must agree on some essential declarations: the recognition of the “communist advance” as a threat to law and freedom, the commitment to the rule of law, the separation of powers, freedom of expression and private property, the “defense” of political and social freedoms, as well as the signatories’ pledge to work for democracy, human rights, pluralism and justice. Largely not paying attention to the pandemic, Vox delegations traveled in 2021, in particular Abascal himself, his colleague Víctor González Coello from Portugal and Spanish MEP Hermann Tertsch to several Latin American countries such as Colombia, Mexico, Peru and Ecuador as well as to the United States.
In doing so, they managed to persuade numerous representatives of politics and civil society to sign the Madrid Charter. Among the signatories are politicians from populist right-wing parties in close harmony with those in the political center. This activism is complemented by the Disenso Foundation, close to VOX, also directed by Abascal, which invites young Latin American politicians to study programs in Spain. In this way, VOX brings together a common project for actors of doubtfully democratic affiliation with representatives of parties firmly established in the political center.
The comparison with what happens on the other political side does not seem entirely absurd. Collaterally, the Spanish right-wing populist party, as a self-proclaimed spearhead against Latin American “totalitarianism” and “communism”, is gaining an international legitimacy it would otherwise hardly have been able to achieve. Therefore, it is not surprising that Abascal wants more for the future: a permanent structure and an annual action plan.
And the political center?
Engaged in government responsibility in the context of Covid-19 or busy with internal problems, many moderate parties were quite surprised by such a decision.
activism. Addressing individuals rather than entire party structures allows both the Puebla Group and the Madrid Forum to ignore the latter.
Precisely for representatives of center-right parties, often slow, it is not easy to react adequately to this tactic. The temptation to jump in the common boat with VOX against the organized and growing left is great. There is often a lack of awareness that truly credible action against organized leftist authoritarianism in the region is only possible with partners whose free democratic identity is unquestionable.
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